Friday, August 18, 2017

7

Sinking into mediocrity

For a country whose people have a reputation for being smart, Lebanon has sunk into mediocrity. It’s been a gradual decline over the years, but much has happened in recent weeks – racial abuse, needless deaths, negligence and a quite bizarre case of air rage – that has highlighted our descent into the pits of shame and incompetence. Quite simply, our moral and societal fabric is unraveling, and there appears to be little anyone can do to stop it.

To begin with, it seems that what passes for the department of health and safety in our proud country is still a work in progress, and all the while people are dying. On Saturday, a wall collapsed at a school in Tripoli, killing three students. Another accident-waiting-to-happen happened, and three families are left to grieve needless deaths. The headmaster has been detained, and the president has promised that the incident will be investigated, but by whom? There is no credible framework to investigate anything with transparency and integrity. Charges will no doubt be brought, but it is unlikely that the deeper underlying issues of institutional negligence, a lack of accountability and a culture of corruption will be addressed.

January’s tragic building collapse in the Fassouh area of Achrafieh should have opened our eyes to the woeful state of disrepair in which thousands of buildings across Lebanon exist. Instead, a scandal is brewing under our very noses. In the days after that accident, there were promises of thorough surveys of those buildings suspected of being unsafe, but so far we have seen nothing, and the buildings continue to come down. On Sunday engineers were sent to the school to see if the surrounding buildings are safe. We have heard it all before. Maybe if they had acted earlier, the boys who died on Saturday would still be alive.

Staying with health and safety, we learned that there is bad meat on the market. A nation is shocked, and yet it shouldn’t be. Economy Minister Nicolas Nahhas has blamed the media for scaremongering and reminded us that “[This problem] is present all around the world,” but to say this is to miss the point that the vast majority of Lebanese have lost faith in a state where payments to overlook details such as sell-by dates have become part of the way business is done. Again, promises have been made to tighten standards, and the issue is due for discussion at the cabinet level. But again, where is the accountability? Where are the resignations? Why is it only when the media does its job, do Lebanese public servants pretend to do theirs?

So where are the voices needed to speak out against an equally rotten society? It is all very well to take to the streets and clash with the security forces over the content of history books, but we won’t mobilize (blocking roads with burning tires on the orders of a political party doesn’t count) to demand electricity, water, welfare and justice. Lebanon’s women will, quite rightly, gather to demand an end to marital rape and the right to pass their nationality onto their children, but where is the voice we need to speak out against the daily rape endured by Lebanon and the Lebanese, a rape that targets everything from our natural resources to our dignity, because at this rate we will have nothing to pass onto our children, whatever nationality they are.

Finally, spare a moment for the passenger who went berserk on an MEA flight from Paris last week. Maybe today’s Lebanon really can wind someone so tight they have no control over where or when they will lose it. Maybe it has pushed us to raise our voices when we shouldn’t and to keep quiet when we should shout from the rooftops our feeling of disgust at the way in which our lives are run.

Up to the point this article!My question is when will the Lebanese take to the streets for the reasons you cite? As to the MEA passenger,I saw previous minister Elias Saba screaming at the hostess for being late in handing him his jacket during Landing endangering her life!This guy should have been arrested right there and then!

March 23, 2012

alsidani

it is a shame when israelis companies are building solar plants in Spain or the deserts of California Lebanon cant keep it meat fresh because of lack of electricity
when the bakhshish mentality will stop and we become really patriots
when will we place the well being of Lebanon first
now aoun want electricity made on offshore boats ,an aspirin for a cancer patient!
in israel i read they are updating ten of thousands of ac units to increase efficiency and reduce electric demand in the summer ,any dstributions of energy efficients bulbs in lebanon?any long term vision by our blind leaders!!!!!!!

March 21, 2012

Mick

I agree with everything you said in the article except the passenger who went berserk on an MEA flight episode. He's a southerner while I'm a northerner.

March 20, 2012

Sami

How can the economic and health ministers say that things are ok and under control now? the expiry date on food is one thing, but keeping it under proper refrigiration is another. Can those ministers assure us that electricity does not get cut from those freezers and refrigirators holding our food in restaurants and in wholesale distribution centers?

March 20, 2012

Sami

Every so called "inspector" in the Lebanese goverment is a thief! just look at their houses and their cars and the jewlery their ugly wives wear. Where did they get the money? They got it by overlooking illegal activities. They got it by falsifying inspection reports. On the other hand, I think the food safety issue is hopeless as long as there is electricity cuts. the worst of the cuts occurs after midnight because that is when most people turn off their generators. The food chain safety is broken.

March 20, 2012

Adam Neira

Prayers for Lebanon.
Nations change when good people attempt to uplift the space they live in.

March 19, 2012

Wajdi

riveting. formidable. parfait.
Written with anger and passion; an excellent piece on what the situation is like...